Andy wasn’t recast in any of the Toy Story films. It’s the same actor in all three.
No, he had to be recast for the younger version in Toy Story 3, for obvious reasons.
He only speaks a few lines, but still it’s a recast.
Not really gonna yay or yay this until I see a teaser trailer. It coul hold some promise. Im just afraid it will be like a Cars 2 where it was more about Mater than the whole crew.
Oh wow. I didn’t not make that connection. I guess that Dory is Finding Nemo’s Mater. The hilarious side character.
Oh gosh… You’re right, Dory is Finding Nemo’s Mater…
Instead of commenting, I guess I’ll just go back to speechless…
Just because she’s a sidekick and comedic, but that’s what Pixar does with most of its sequels.
They shifted protagonism from Lighting to Mater in Cars and from Sulley to Mike in Monsters. Now they’re doing it from Marlin to Dory.
But I think of those three, only Mater can be a problematic main character, which accounted for some of most glaring weaknesses in Cars 2.
I’m not insinuating that Finding Dory will be a bad film because it’ll have a secondary character as the main character now, or because of similarities from Cars 2 it will fail.
There is no evidence obviously so far to justify it either way. I’m just saying that this is all an interesting development, and that I didn’t notice those two similarities until the commenter before me pointed it out.
No, I’m not saying you insinuated that.
I’m just acknowledging the similarity, but also distressing the difference.
The only Pixar sequels so far that hasn’t changed protagonists are Toy Story 2 and 3. Woody remained the main character for the entire trilogy.
Let’s see how it fares for Mosters University and this one.
^That’s exactly why I think this is all the more interesting. I thought Mater took Cars 2 in quite an interesting direction. That movie worked just fine to me, and while it is quite obvious although not certain Mike will star in Monsters University, that should be good, too. And this is also why I think Finding Dory will be all the more interesting and, well, probably just better - because of the protagonist change (just me).
All three of these cases are healthy changes for the franchises, in my opinion. The majority of audiences (not the analysts or critics) seemed to enjoy Mater in the spotlight based on who I’ve spoken to IRL, and I bet they’ll like the change with Mike and Dory just the same too. I also think it’s a clever way to ensure that none of these films need to branch out beyond two films necessarily. It’s like they take the two most important characters of each “buddy” film and give them their own movie, and I think that’s really clever. Toy Story kind of warrants three movies for having started it all and, IN A WAY, being the best (at least 1 & 2, and 3 was really good too, but again, that’s just me!)
I can’t believe I totally forgot about that beginning scene of him as a kid; I was only thinking of him as an adult. You’re right, of course. Sorry, Spirit!!
Don’t worry, it’s a minuscule appearance.
But maybe it could be done with Nemo.
Yes, I think so too. I’m pretty sure Nemo will be re-cast. It’s not uncommon for Pixar. Even Lightning McQueen is re-cast for the Cars Toons, and it’s not like Owen Wilson is that unavailable. I wonder if Jordan Nagai, a.k.a. Russell from Up, would be up for the role! Or Charlie Bright, who voiced Young Andy and Peaty the pea-in-the-pod in Toy Story 3, would also be a good choice!
Yeah, I should, like, totally inform the FBI, CIA and Interpol that Pixar has committed grand theft intellectual-property! 
But yeah, I was kinda angry at Pixar at the time I wrote the rants on Cars 2 (Brenda Chapman being fired, Toy Story and Cars fans being overly defensive here, et cetera). Some members were praising the trailer for its music (or maybe I was under the perception they were, it’s hard to remember through tinted glasses), and I wanted to call Pixar out on it and mention that the trailer song is not a preview of the soundtrack per se, but taken from another film’s.
Most trailers would use popular songs or trailer-house music, but this is one of the rare instances that a song from another film’s soundtrack is used in a trailer, so I went zeroed on it (again, this was when I was upset at Pixar for the second time in my life).
It’s kinda difficult for me to say. In terms of mainstream Western studios, Dreamworks and Pixar are tying for me at the moment. Dreamworks isn’t a consistent studio - I had a talk with Phileas in-person on my recent Sydney trip and I mentioned that Dreamworks puts out a good and “bad” (as in not-so-good but still okay) movie every year. So for 2010, it was HTTYD (good), Megamind (good) and Shrek 4 (“bad”), 2011, Kung Fu Panda 2 (good) and Puss In Boots (“bad”), 2012, Madagascar 3 (“bad”), Rise Of The Guardians (good).
Pixar, on the other hand, has delivered critical and commercial-acclaimed movies for the past quarter century. But over the last few years, their quality has declined in my eyes (Cars 2 and Brave). I also find myself not liking some of their films that others love (Toy Story 3 and Brave) and liking some of their films that others don’t love as much (Cars 2 and Cars). With Monsters U and Finding Dory, they’re also becoming like Dreamworks in a way by relying on sequels for revenue-generation.
Blue Sky and Animal Logic have produced two of my favourite animated films of all-time (Rio and Legend Of The Guardians). It is a coincidence that they have a mostly avian cast.
To answer your question, I’d have to go with Studio Ghibli. I haven’t watched all their films, but I have yet to hate/dislike any of those that I’ve seen. The closest they have made to a “stinker” is Tales Of Earthsea, and even then I still found things to enjoy from it. I have yet to hear from anyone that they’ve hated a single Ghibli film, whereas I can find at least one person who despised a film from any of the above studios I’ve mentioned.
LQstudies, I pretty much agree with your entire post too! 
Here are some bits I’ll adress:
I was also affected by the negative reviews, but in a way that I actually agreed with them! I was sick of the Pixar fanboys here and elsewhere shooting down the critics when the latter were giving their honest opinion. I don’t think the critics were out to “get” Pixar (maybe some of them did, I can’t say for sure). But I defended them because they are being paid to do their job, there’s no “conflict of interest” unlike, say, a member on this forum or Upcoming Pixar saying Cars 2 was good. I was more inclined to trust the neutral film critic than anyone here or on other Pixar sites. So I went in with a hopeful, yet sceptical mind.
I was pleasantly surprised. An anime-fan friend I brought along loved the Tokyo scenes and Japanese references. I enjoyed the scenes in France and the French references (Tomber, the car who can easily fall over, the Marchés aux Puces, etc). So I had the opposite experience of you, I went in feeling upset and all ready to hate it (but secretly hoping I would like it) and I loved it on my first viewing. Our second viewings were the same, I went to see it in IMAX for the rewatch and I came out still loving it, so I knew that it was good for me.
Yes, one of the things I disliked about Toy Story 3 was how they really milked the tears there. At least Up and Wall-E felt authentic, but something about Toy Story 3 just made me feel that they were trying too hard to pluck at those hearstrings.
Regarding not reading reviews, since Brave, I’ve been going on Pixar “media blackouts”. It’s not difficult lately, I have other distractions (work, other fandoms) to keep me busy.
While I agree this gives us confidence, I feel that Pixar should really start letting go of the old guards and invite fresh blood into the Brain Trust. Kung Fu Panda 2 had a different director from the first movie, but it ended up being just as good, if not better. I’m tired of seeing the same directors (like Saldanha or Wedge for the Ice Age sequels), even though, yes, it gives that assurance that they will be familiar with the material and faithful to continuity.
Yeah, Cars is pretty much a cash cow franchise for Pixar, and I’m glad that they are many fans all over the world like me. It could be seen as “selling out”. Am I mad? As I said in the Finding Dory post on my blog, not really. It just shows that Pixar is like any other commercial studio. It’s not the “last bastion of great animation” (imagine me airquoting with my fingers for added effect). It’s a studio that runs on money - from your own pockets! This is something I explained in a post several years ago.
So fans shouldn’t fool themselves for one moment that Pixar doesn’t have commercial interests.
I do respect Pixar, though, for championing the animation industry. And I, too, hope that others will realise there are other great (and struggling) studios out there to support them.
I certainly hope not! It’s actually the only Pixar movie that I’m truly excited to see on the level of Epic for me this year.
Dear Mr. Stanton,
When the announcement came up, mixed feelings struck me. What? Is this for money? Well, duh, that’s what even the original films are for. Some people look at you as they look at Dreamsworks. Sequels, sequels, possible spin-offs. But I digress. If the whole point of it was setting standards of comparison against clearly distinctive animation houses, then… well, that’s just missing the point and brutally setting bias standards.
And no, the need and scrouging for millions of dollars, this NEVER rules out the sincerity in the product. Stanton, I know you well. You may have made millions out of WALL-E but you loved WALL-E. Pixar made millions out of Toy Story but it loved Toy Story. I believe you, especially when you speak about the making of those films. And this goes too for the animators of Dreamsworks.
Aside from that, you could fund your original products with sequel money (Inside Out, and Day of the Dead movie, here I commmmeeeeee!).
But the darn movie hasn’t even came out yet, so why should it be immediately define it as the money grubber. Even Cars 2 was not without quality (though I felt the be-yourself message was confused). And Monsters University awaits judgment (early screening on April 22, here I ccooommmmeeee!).
Mr. Stanton, the cast and crew, the rest of Pixar, I’ll give you my blessings to move forward with the project whether I’d be disappointed or not with the final product. Surprise me. After my disappointment with Brave (which also had a confused message and the movie itself lies between mediocre and good), you did managed to surprise me. How? Just a 40 second preview of your Umbrella short. You will always be loved by me as the animators who cared.
So surprise me again.
I quite agree with some of the points made on here. I personally dont think a ‘Finding Dory’ was needed and I still dont know what to think about it really. But I too have learned since Cars 2 not to read reviews or anything like that until I’ve seen the movie (which is what I’m avoiding now with Star Trek Into Darkness). I think part of my problem with Cars 2 is that I was too easily influenced by what the critics thought. Though I dont think it’s an amazing film, I dont think its a terrible one either. I always do try to at least give Pixar the benefit of the doubt, so I guess I’ll just have to see what happens.
This movie will likely be a good movie, cheer up people! The only bad Pixar movies IMO are A Bug’s Life and Cars 2. This movie will likely be a good one!
I have to disagree with you on A Bug’s Life^^ (I love that film), but on the other hand I find Dory to be an annoying character and dislike Ellen DeGeneres’s voice, so to have her be the main character isn’t an encouraging thought.
I too really like A Bug’s Life. One of Pixar’s funniest.
Agreed. Calling A Bug’s Life bad isn’t objective.
More appropriate would be saying that it’s not of your personal liking, which is a completely different thing.